Random Prize #04: Putty&Paint throws issue number 9 of the Scale Model Handbook into the Random Prize Pool.
This is definatly a good read!

Random Prize #05: Morland Studioshands
out tons of miniature- and hobby candy. This is the first set of their
sponsoring. A great mix of different sized, beautiful miniatures, some
basing material and a plinth.

by Massive Voodoo

Hey jungle painters,

we often have the honor to chat with fellow painters from all around the world on shows like Monte San Savino or the Duke of Bavaria. Often we realize that there are so many other painters, which are not present on shows. Today MV had the chance to have chat with a famous Ukrainian painter: Sergey Popovichenko.

MV: Hey
Sergey, nice to have you here. As some of our readers will know, you
are a well known painter from the Ukraine. You paint your minis in a
very dark and realistic way. Please tell us a bit about yourself.

Sergey:Greetings
my friends!!I´m
alsovery
happy to have this chatwith you!What
can Itell you about
myself...My name isSergeyPopovichenko. I
livein Ukraine,
in the capitalKiev.AndI
have beenpaintingminiaturesfor
more than sevenyears.I getthe
most pleasurefrom itin my life.Iembodymy
ideas. Inminiature, I find my
expression. There isnothinglimitingme, andsuccess
depends onme.It'sworth
a lot.

At the
moment,I'm notonly an artist, but also a
teacherof the KievNational Universityof
Technology and Design. My
specialityis to design
engineerequipment
for the light industry. It wasthe workof
the teacherallowed me
todevelopas an artist.I
hadsome free timeafter schoolwith
students andwanted to
dosomething other thandesigningof
equipment.It
has enabledme to
remembermy childhoodfascination withtoy
soldiers.

Defensor Romanum

MV: It´s
always interesting to hear the tales of how somebody got into the
hobby. So please tell us your tale of the brush 

Sergey: My wayof engaging inminiaturelong
enough. When Iwas a child,my
family wasnotrich, there
was a timewhen wedid not even havea
TV. Idevoteda
lot of timein reading
booksand drawing.Over time,I
became moreinterested
inadventureand historical novels.
Idrew
andredrewthe charactersfrom
the books. Of all thegifts thatwere
givento meI'm mostfond
ofmysoldiers.Iarrangedthe
waron the floorof mychildren's
room, gluedcardboardcastles
andsiege machinesfrom wood. Thus, beganmy passion formodeling. Then,whenI was at universityI
cameover pewterfigurines, acompanyunknown to me. And
atmodels magazineI saw howthey
canbe paintedand arranged. Ibegan tryingto
paint. Then, when I gotinternet, I
became acquainted withthe
works ofartistsfrom around the world.
I was impressed, so my
enthusiasmonly
intensified, and the results began
to grow.

MV: As
most of our readers are from Western Europe or the US we are sure they
don´t know a lot about the painting community in Ukraine.
Please tell us a bit about it.

Sergey:Talkabout the communityin
Ukrainecan be long.There are manyemerging
artists, anda few guyswhose
worksinspire
respect. Among themare KonstantinPinaev,VictorOsipenko,StanislavKurilenko.
You couldalready
seetheir workon theP&PandPF.However,in
comparison to Europe,the number of peoplewho are interested inminiatureis
very small andthere is no organization for it.Far
morepeople makemodels of tanks,
aircraft and ships. A
large number ofthem is more organized. Theyhaveclubs and theyhold
exhibitions on which you sometimes can find asmall
number offigures.

However,
it is nice that there aresculptors whoare
collaboratingwith a
variety firms from Europe. Among them,OlegPogosyan. You
should have seenhisfiguresin
mypainting.He creates awonderfulknights.HesculptsforTartarMiniatures,First Legion, Mercurymodels. ChronosMiniatures.

Dungeon of Skulls

Arbalester

MV: As we already mentioned, you are famous for your dark and very realistic
style of painting. What´s your philosophy of painting? Where do you
get your inspiration from?

Sergey: My style of painting is
probably a reflection of my philosophy and my view of history. War is
bloody work, and I can clearly see the ancient times in muted colors.
So I imagine these warriors are not as bright as they are usually
drawn. Most of the figures, which are created by sculptors are quite
brutal. So why not emphasize their brutality with a brutal muted
painting. Mud and blood in acceptable amounts will speak about the
environments in which they are fighting.

Justdyesavailablesimplesoldierswere
not sobrightandsostandsin antiquityas
in modern times. Sothis is another reasonto mutecolors.
Of course, themorenoble warriors, I would
drawmore
clearly, if required bythe situation. But
I tryto choosesimpleSlayersfor painting. I
preferlegionaries andcenturions, not
legates. I
preferinfantrymen,sergeants andknightsin battlerather
thankings.

Bertrand du Guesclin

MV: What
was you greatest success in you hobby-life and of course why?

Sergey: I hopeI have not yetachievedthe greatest success andmymainachievementis yet to come. I
haveseveral awardsat exhibitions inSpain, Italy andRussia. It's
nice, but much nicerto conceivea
newinteresting projectand bring itto
completion.In this liesthe greatest pleasureand I hopeIhave the strengthfor
the realization ofall my
ideas.If I makethem, I think you
would be interested.

MV: At
the moment there are a lot of miniature companies. Which is your
favourite one?

Sergey:I can not namea favoritecompanythere are interestingto meperiods
andfigureson these topicsfrom
different manufacturers.If
the figure isinteresting
for me, I do not watchacompany
name.

MV: Beside
brushes, minis and colors, what is the most important thing on your
table?

Sergey: This isof coursethe
camera:)But there are thingsnear the tablewithout
whichI can not be.
This is mybike and my dumbbells.And of coursemy
computerand books.SometimesI
like toplayshootersandstrategy or readan interesting book.

MV: Do
you have a picture of your table? Please, do not clean it for it :)

Sergey: I can notchoose one. There
are many greatfiguresfrom thegreat
sculptors.

MV: Last
question: please tell us which would be the greatest development in
your hobby?

Sergey: In the pasta great developmentwasto tryoil
paints. Work
with oil onacrylic
-it issurprisingly pleasant.
It givesremarkable
results.The greatest
developmentin the
future-learn tosculpt.
It would be greatto
embodymyownideas.

There will be only one article today and this one will be up next week for you to read.

#01
In this article you will see a project log of Roman's take on a 1:35 Military
Model from Alpine Miniatures. See how it grew to become a special gift
to the organisator of the recently held Scale Model Challenge.

by Roman aka jar

Hello Jungle of MASSIVE VOODOO,

it has been a while since I wrote my last WIP-thoughts.
Now it it's time for it, but be warned this write up is also mixed with Kong Fu, some very personal thoughts of mine to explain my painter's soul nowadays.

It happened some days after the Monte San Savino Show.
Monte always marks a spot for me in the year. A spot where I feel the need to calm down.
Autumn is standing at the front porch, telling you that winter might soon arrive and well I am a child of the summer. I love it warm, sun, power, endless energies.

My miniatures I took to Monte San Savino Show.

Autumn for me feels like, honestly: Blahgnarglohnowhybluargh!
I do not know why but it feels stranger every year. I feel the need to calm down. Focus on myself, drink tea, do less activity in the internet. Maybe I just need some holidays after this year passed without one so far.

I said it happened some days after the Monte San Savino Show. That weekend was beautiful and really great, but it also marks a spot. A spot telling me the 'season' of this years miniature painting madness is over. Sure there is still some private coachings and a painting class in the Netherlands ahead and I won't calm down on these, but I feel to calm down for myself - for example by trying to write something on MV every day, answering my mails like a greek god of speed ... calm down and breathe. Drink Tea, find time to search for new music I like, enjoy good books while drinking tea. I think you are getting the idea of what I am talking of, eh?

Well, being back in the studio after the show in Italy felt very strange. First of all I took most of my finished models home into my cabinets to have the studio's cabinets free for new ideas and projects. Some were sold and are at the moment shipped through the world. Then I tried to paint and painting was no fun. So I cleaned up the place.

I just don't know, but that felt good. Since then I am not caring to much about my autumn-blues. It's there, I accept it, let it happen. The difference to summer is, the power of the sun guides me and I feel strong. Autumn is more like ... I just don't know, I follow where the blues takes me.

... and so far it took me to realize I need to breathe and calm myself down. Taking a little holidays on things in my life that keep me from focus on what is important for me. Some of the past weeks were truely filled with me going to bed so early it did not feel 'normal'.

In autumn I just want to be a lazy cat.

... but I quickly realized I am no cat, no matter how early I try to get myself to sleep. My mind needs to work and luckily autumn does not take me down like it did in some of the past years as I learned to work with my energies and capabilities. I learned to take a breath in the right time and now it's that time.

Well, can I sum up this write up? - No.
I just don't know. I won't be gone, I will just do things a little more relaxed. I will focus my upcoming blogging work on the BANANALICIOUS and will do some other blogposts for sure, but I won't fly straight like a bolt-thrower like I did this year until now. I just don't know, I just need to drink a tea now :)

by Massive Voodoo

Hey Jungle Painters,

time for your last tutorial voting winner.
This time Roman talks about painting the Virago (Ilyad Games, Female Vorag Barbarian, a great model, but sad to the toe - very rare as the company Ilyad Games is no more. You can find some rare Ilyad Games Miniatures on ebay, sometimes and they are far from cheap.

FOREWORD
First of all I want to give thanks to my friend Rafael Garcia Marin who played a big part in getting me this miniature. Keep an eye on his blog, it is worth it: Volomir's blog.

Well, as I am selling most of my own works as I am freelance artist in miniature painting one day I decided to create a little special collection for myself, without selling the models after the paintwork. I decided to slowly get my fingers on some Ilyad Games Miniatures via ebay or other occasions. My collection is at three painted models at the moment and some unpainted resin in my drawer.

BASING / PRIMING
I also decided to create simple bases for them. So I went with some stones with superglue on her gaming base. Nothing too fency, but still nice. Primed her white with surface primer by Vallejo. Using the airbrush for that. Why? Well, it is definatly finer than using sprays out of the can.

Next step was the usual one, taking basic tones for every material and placing them as a preparation for further work. Using the brush here. As you can see in the fur I already included a little light situation sketch, using zenithal light theory while applying my first colour layers.

Next step was painting first gentle lights to every area. Base, skin, clothes, metals and leather. I even was in the mood to throw some sandy pigments to the base to make her boots look more dusty. Don't ask me why, I just did.

Well, I now got interested in working on the fur and the skin parts as those make most of the model. So far the skin was too yellowish, so I took some skintone that is more reddish or pink to work further on the skin. The fur recieved some detailed lights in a blue grey to seperate single hairs from eachother. Also her mohawk recieveda dark wash to have the different hair seperated from eachother.

After this I went for some details on the metal. Working with a brigher metal tone here to give the pieces volume. The skin also recieved some glazes of dark red-brown to make out the shadow situations even better.

You can see the red glazes really come into play on the following photos. Additional to that I did some darklining. That means I seperated different material from eachother by using a dark brown line between both of them. You can see that pretty good on her leg to the fabric, on the fur and leather parts to the skin.

Now it was time for final lights on the skin, fur and some blood effect. Using a a bright blue for some tribal paint. In this case I did not want to have it look like a tattoo. If I would have gone for the tattoo I would have mixed in some skintone into a darker blue to make it look more included in the skin. This time I wanted to have it look like paint, she painted on her skin before the battle.

The base recieved some edge highlights on the stones. Leather parts recieved some more light and as I decided to make these models of my collection decent ones I felt the end coming closer.

She looked like this in my cabinet and I was already happy with the result.

Final photos of her revelead what I was aiming for. By putting more work and time into the upper area, adding more details there her lower legs were not that important for me anymore. Click to enlarge the photo:

Well, this was not a very strong article. I know, but I do hope that some of you might find inspiration in it.

Search Massive Voodoo

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Welcome to the Jungle...

... MASSIVE VOODOO’s jungle, where some apes share their thoughts and ideas around their beloved passion, the hobby of miniature painting and sculpting.

Feel welcome to come and check the jungle for tons of articles, interesting tutorials, creative competitions and the simple joy of happy painting hidden behind every tree. We hope that everyone finds their own banana in here, if not do not hesitate to ask the apes. We are more than happy for you to post in the comments section to help turn this jungle into the lush, overgrown painting corner we hope it will become.